


'Three months later, they're still running into groups of rabids'

by themegalosaurus



Series: SPN episode codas [8]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angry Dean Winchester, Angst, Episode Tag, Episode: s11e02 Form and Void, Gen, Season/Series 11
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-22
Updated: 2015-10-22
Packaged: 2019-09-06 16:07:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16835995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themegalosaurus/pseuds/themegalosaurus
Summary: Sam tells Dean he was infected with the virus. Dean doesn't take it well.(Coda to episode 11x02, 3 of 3)





	'Three months later, they're still running into groups of rabids'

**Author's Note:**

> Crossposted from my Tumblr, one of a couple of fics exploring how Dean finding this out might go

Three months later, they’re still running into groups of rabids. There seem to be knots of them, scattered around; small towns reduced to shuffling zombies, numbers dwindling as the infected start to die more quickly than the disease can spread. There are only twelve or thirteen people left in this particular hamlet by the time that Sam & Dean get there. Only two of them are still compos mentis: an old man too infirm to leave his bed and a shaking, skinny kid of 12 too loyal to leave his grandfather.

When Sam and Dean arrive at their house, the boy’s crying in the downstairs hallway. He went out, looking for food, as far as Sam can make out; ran into a rabid and found himself contaminated. Sam can see the dark, vine-like veins already starting to stand out at the side of his neck.

“I’m gonna die,” the kid’s saying. “I’m gonna die I’m gonna die.”

Sam hushes him, puts his hand on his shoulder. “It’s OK,” he says. “We can fix it. We’ve got a cure.” He’s not sure how much the boy is hearing, keyed up on fear and adrenaline; perhaps already slipping into the fever that Sam remembers so well.

“You can’t help me,” the boy says. “It’s in me. All of them die.”

Sam glances at Dean, who’s halfway down the stairs with the old man leaning heavy on his arm. His brother’s talking to the guy - distracted, probably, so Sam risks it.

“They don’t all die,” he tells the kid. “I didn’t.”

The boy looks at him properly, then; eyes focusing for the first time, features settling into a wary expression of interest. “You – you were…?” He gestures at his throat.

“Yes,” Sam says. “And I got real sick. Sicker than you are. But I was okay in the end.” The boy’s upper arm is thin, bony. He’s been shacked up here, desperate, a long time already. “It won’t even take long. Just a little heat and you’ll be feeling better. Then we can get you and your grandpa away.”

“Okay,” says the kid, quietly; so Sam digs in his duffel for a pair of tweezers and dunks a cotton wool ball into the jug of holy oil that he’s taken to keeping slung at his side. Their supply is dwindling rapidly, but he can’t worry about that yet. He sets the ball aflame with a flick of his lighter; brings it up to the boy’s throat. The kid cries out, sharp and high, but Sam doesn’t waver as the veins on his neck blaze golden, then red, before fading back into normality.

“Oh,” says the kid, and he clings to Sam’s arm, fingers dug tight into the flesh. He starts to cry.

“It’s OK,” Sam says. He pats the boy’s shoulder again, shamefully conscious of his awkwardness. It’s stupid but it’s been so long since anybody touched him in kindness that he’s kind of forgotten how to do it. He’s worried about encroaching on this stranger’s personal space. “You did good,” Sam tells him.

He lets the kid cry it out for a little while until Dean pops his head around the door again, impatient. “You alright to get him to the car?” he says. “I’m gonna go talk to the others.” They’ve already cured the rest of the people in the village, corralled them into the general store and lit a ring of holy oil around them. They left them there in a hurry after one man remembered infecting this kid.

Sam takes the boy to the car, where his grandfather is waiting; sits there with him until Dean arrives and stays seated in the passenger seat while Dean drives all four of them two hundred miles down the highway to the town where the boy’s uncle lives. “You’re gonna be OK,” Dean tells the both of them as he leads them up the driveway. Sam waves at the kid through the window. He hopes Dean’s right. Everything seems so uncertain, lately, the Darkness an ongoing and unknowable threat. Still. What else is there to do but hope?

On the road, the stress of the day catches up to Sam quickly and he finds himself dozing, head knocking against the window. As they pass the town boundary, Dean clears his throat.

“You were infected?” he says.

Oh.

“It was a long time ago,” Sam says. “Back at the hospital, when you were off with – with Amara.” He looks over at his brother. “I’m fine.”

“Not the point, Sammy,” says Dean. “Not the _goddamn_ point.” His fingers tighten on the steering wheel, turning white at the knuckle. “How many more secrets are you keeping, Sam?”

A prickle of tension runs over Sam’s skin. He feels heavy in his stomach. Every time, every time he thinks he’s got through it and something comes up: another disappointment.

“Sorry,” he says. “I didn’t want to worry you.”

“Of course I worry,” says Dean, and for a moment Sam feels grateful. “Who the fuck knows what else you’ve got up to when I’ve turned my back?”


End file.
